Mr. Balfour made a very striking speech on his Irish
administration at Wolverhampton yesterday week. But his extra-political and most important point was that he showed how the interdict on " land-grabbers " really throws the agriculture of Ireland into the hands of the laziest and least competent class, and excludes all those who are specially likely and able to succeed,—and this besides confiscating the tenant-right of which Mr. Gladstone gave the tenant in 1881 a free sale. "AU those who had failed, all those who had no capital, and those who had shown their incapacity to carry on their business, are retained," while all the energetic are excluded from getting a chance of pushing their fortunes in Ireland. This is really what the so-called patriots of Ireland are fighting for, that the man who has shown his inertness and his helplessness is to be kept on the soil at all costs, while the man who can bring fresh capital and fresh ability to Irish agriculture, is to be kept out as if he were a leper.
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